From drought ridden to growing a small forest

Excellent Development

Excellent's former Individual Giving Manager, Chloe Waite, reflects on visiting Kenya and the flourishing farm that belongs to Theresa and her baby Precious.

When we arrive at Theresa’s farm, the air is fresh and the ground is covered with dolichos, and tall, green pigeon pea crops. Theresa is here to meet us, with her youngest child Precious in a carry sling at her side. She has just finished harvesting her cowpeas and green grams; wispy remnants of the harvest lie scattered on a patch of ground.

Our partner organisation, the Africa Sand Dam Foundation (ASDF), has brought us here to show us Theresa’s farm. Theresa has been working with ASDF since the end of 2011, when her community came together to build three sand dams.

"The farm looks like a small forest. It feels nice, sitting under the trees and breathing that fresh air. To me, that is very important."

Before the sand dams, collecting water would take up almost all of her time. With a 6km walk to the nearest water point and a wait of one or two hours, Theresa’s entire life was restricted by the stranglehold of water scarcity.

Since then, and with ASDF’s support, she has made many changes to her farm – digging terraces to reduce soil erosion and retain water in her fields, planting trees to provide ground cover and shade, and planting a wider variety of drought-tolerant crops.

The techniques she has learnt have made a huge difference to the productivity of her farm. Before she would only plant three acres but now she plants six and a half acres. It’s a lot of work, but the results are worth it.

She takes us to see her harvest of cowpeas and green grams, all neatly packed in 90kg storage bags. This grain is currency to Theresa – selling it at market will enable her to raise enough money to pay for her three children to get an education. Like all parents, she wants to give them the opportunity for a better future.

When we ask Theresa about how she feels looking at her transformed farm she says, “The farm looks like a small forest. It feels nice, sitting under the trees and breathing that fresh air. To me, that is very important.”

Without the time that Theresa has saved from the long, hard walks to collect water, she simply would not have been able to invest so much time in planting her farm, and her life would be very different.

Now she can provide her children with a healthy diet, an education and a clean, fresh environment to grow up in; the future of Theresa and her family is looking much brighter.

Create lasting change with sand dams - please donate what you can

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£5could provide a group with the tools, seeds and materials to produce vegetables, fruits and grains

£10could provide expert training and support to empower groups to take ownership of their projects

£20enable a self-help group to build a series of sand dams, bringing abundant water to their families

Supporting people in drylands to build sand dams, which provide a local supply of water, means that less children die each year from curable diarrhoea and women no longer have to bare this burden. Can you help by making a donation that will stop the suffering of communities living in drylands?

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Becky Little and Jason Maddrell helped to build a sand dam on an Excellent expedition in 2012. They returned to lead the Excellent 2016 expedition and visited the same community four years’ on, and were astonished to see how much the area has changed.

The results of a new sand dam are astonishing to see - a green oasis in the midst of a barren and parched landscape. This community has been using the water from the dam for growing vegetables and keeping their livestock healthy.

For rural women in the world’s drylands, life is defined by the burden of collecting water. For the old and the young, the sick and the healthy, it is a chore with no relief. Even when pregnant, women must trek over long distances in order to provide their families with water.

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Read about our plan to directly support other organisations to build sand dams, in turn, realising our vision to support millions of the world’s poorest people by helping them to transform their own lives through water and soil conservation in drylands.